Macbeth by Verdi, Wed 17 Feb 2016, From (2016/2016), Directed by Balasz Koválik, Conductor Alexander Kalajdzic, Stadttheater, Bielefeld, Germany

Dramma lirico in four acts libretto by Francesco Maria Piave and Andrea Maffei // Based on The Tragedy of Macbeth by William Shakespeare // In Italian with German surtitles As a warning example of unscrupulous lust for power, Shakespeare's Macbeth has lost nothing of its topicality, even 400 years after the death of the great poet, especially in Giuseppe Verdi's setting. Verdi's opera deals with the psychological neglect of two people who are consumed by their ambition and unbridled desire. They fall into a bloody intoxication of destruction, which ultimately becomes their own undoing. Again and again, the work opens up a view of the social consequences and manipulative mechanisms of tyranny. With Macbeth , Giuseppe Verdi broke the operatic conventions of his time and created one of his darkest and most impressive works. Powerful choral scenes, from which the rebellion of the oppressed and persecuted can be heard, contrast with expressive arias and duets, in which the exceptional psychological situations of the protagonists are sonically illuminated. This is how Verdi created an unmistakable masterpiece.